


Hands Clean

by westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Episode Tag, Episode: s03e15 Dead Irish Writers, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-05-01
Updated: 2003-05-01
Packaged: 2019-05-31 06:22:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15113609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist/pseuds/westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist
Summary: Politics, MS, good intentions, poor results, fear, love, future, past.





	Hands Clean

**Author's Note:**

> A copy of this work was once archived at National Library, a part of the [ West Wing Fanfiction Central](https://fanlore.org/wiki/West_Wing_Fanfiction_Central), a West Wing fanfiction archive. More information about the Open Doors approved archive move can be found in the [announcement post](http://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/8325).

**Hands Clean**  
**by:** Kasey

**Character(s):** Jed/Abbey  
**Category(s):** POST-EP: Dead Irish Writers, Songfic  
**Rating:** TEEN  
**Disclaimer:** Song by Alanis, characters by Sorkin.  
**Summary:** Politics, MS, good intentions, poor results, fear, love, future, past.  


She sat for a long time on the couch, awake, thinking. He was off doing something of some level of importance, she was sure - maybe in the situation room, maybe talking with Toby about...whatever the thing was with Lord John, the cheeky Brit. 

Truth be told, she needed to be alone. To have time to think about it all and...dwell on it without Donna making regrettable comments or Amy and CJ voicing drunken opinions or Jed trying to rush her out the door and make jokes so she would stop being so upset about it or Leo trying to tiptoe around her. 

How had it gotten to that point? she wondered. It had been...nothing to start with, nothing more than a cause of worry for her that something would happen in the future to make it worse, and a set of warning signs. Then it had snowballed a little bit...Leo was in town. 

Honestly? When Jed had arrived home looking a little bit dazed and overwhelmed and said Leo was int own, her first thought had been that maybe Leo was off the wagon again - which wasn't to say she didn't trust Leo or anything, she just...she'd seen him for so many years be either a drunk or white-knuckled up to his elbows...And Jed looked like he himself might fall over. 

Little did she realize what it all would turn into. 

It was supposed to be to keep Hoynes honest. To keep him from being smarmy and a shoo-in. To keep the jackass of a Vice President from being electged on his predecessor's coattails. To...To keep Jed busy and get Leo back into politics and maybe open a door for later. Maybe if things worked right, Jed would run someday...or he might end up a Cabinet Secretary or an economic advisor. 

And his health was never supposed to matter in THAT - it was a non-issue because he would never WIN! He was NEVER supposed to win, he was supposed to get his ass kicked. 

Then it started turning into a real team and they...they finished a strong second and go Wiley to drop out and then somehow managed to beat Hoynes which had been unthinkable and all of a sudden-... 

All of a sudden, they were moving into the White House and she was wondering what the hell was going on and how he'd won and what the hell he was gonna be going on NOW. 

> _If it weren't for your maturity none of this would have happened_  
>  If you weren't so wise beyond your years  
> I would've been a be to control myself  
> If it weren't for my attention you wouldn't have been successful and  
> If it werent' for me you would never have amounted to very much

Then it exploded - MS-Gate, not the White House, Abbey thought to herself, smirking slightly at the thought of CJ on "Dangling Modifier Patrol". Her husband had, in fact, NOT been eaten. 

Her career, her identity...that was another story all together. 

She was First Lady Mrs. Bartlet. MRS. Bartlet. Not Doctor anymore. 

And, for the life of her, she could not remember when she had changed that. When she'd stopped calling herself "Doctor" - she'd always been Dr. Bartlet while Jed was Congressman, Governor...and yet at some point during the campaign she'd changed her title so that now the only one who called her "Dr. Bartlet" was Sam...or Jed when he wanted the turn-on. 

She sure as hell didn't feel like a doctor anymore. 

Doctors, she thought when she was young, fixed EVERYTHING. Her brother broke his wrist - the doctors fixed it. Her grandmother was six - the doctors fixed it. She split open her lip and the doctors stitched it right up and made it better. 

She couldn't fix a damn thing anymore. She couldn't tell Jed why things were the way they were, or why he was sick, or why his brain was deteriorating and hers wasn't, or why the hearings were so horrible for her - he didn't get that the whole idea for her of having to say she was wrong and she should be punished-...he didn't get that medicine was her source of pride, it was what she'd always done and she'd always been content to do that by day and be the perfect Governor's wife by night if need be, so long as she got that time during the day to be herself and NOT connected to Jed...she was a doctor. She helped people, she-...she saved a little kid who came in or...or a mother of three or a grandfather or a favourite aunt or...whomever. Jed was saving the poor children fo the world and she was saving the scared and sick people nearby. 

She didn't have that anymore. She was powerless and a figurehead, two things she had never, ever wanted. 

> _Ooh, this could be messy_  
>  But you don't seem to mind  
> Ooh, don't go telling everybody  
> And overlook this supposed crime

Everyone kept saying "No one will remember a few years from now that you forfeited your license for x years"...she would remember. She would remember every damn day. 

Like Leo had told Josh regarding the President's censure - yes, people forget these things, history forgets these things, but Presidents don't. 

And yet... 

and yet Jed was already acting over it- either he'd gotten much better at faking things, or he was busy, y'know, being sleep-deprived because of Toby being an ass or he was...maybe he really wa sover it, maybe he was just so glad it was over that he didn't give a damn about the censure. 

She doubted that, but it was definitely a possibility. 

> _We'll fast-forward to a few years later_  
>  And no one knows except the both of us  
> And I have honoured your request for silence  
> And you've washed your hands clean of this

She thought, with a faint smile, of how Jed hadbeen when they had first met at Notre Dame; Definitely cute but...he seemed to almost cower at any raised voice, he shyed from voicing opinions or, when he did, there was a hint of a nervous glint in his eyes. 

But slowly, gently, she pulled him from the shell he'd created to hide behind when need be - like whenever he was in his father's house. 

She'd always been well-liked by most people, and she'd sort of taught him to talk more to people...to socialize...to schmooze while running for office. 

So, she thought, she was partly to blame for all this. Had it not been for all her convincing him that people *would* like him, that he *was* a good person...It had all created his Montana-sized ego. 

He still needed her. 

She'd stayed away a long time out of anger and spite and frustration...but he needed her. Because he was the most powerful man in the world, yet he couldn't fix everything. 

Not a wounded FBI negotiator. 

Not a hurricane. 

Not the almost-death of his almost-son. 

Not the MS. 

Not the death of his close friends. 

Not his best friend's rugged individualism, regardless of the potential personal consequences. 

Not Toby being an ass. 

And she couldn't always help anyway...but she always tried. 

> _You're essentially an employee_  
>  And I like you having to depend on me  
> You're a kind of protege  
> And one day you'll say you learned all you know from me and  
> I know you depend on me like a young thing would to a guardian  
> I know you sexualize me like a young thing would and I think I like it.

She honestly couldn't remember when certain things had come about - when they'd decided not to tell anyone. Had they specifically said "Let's not tell anyone", or had it been unspoken? She didn't remember - good thing she didn't have to testify, because while that defense worked for a former president with Alzheimers, it wouldn't work for her. It hadn't been a conspiracy at the time...had it? She'd never meant for it to be - she'd never said to doctors "Don't tell anyone about this", she'd never specifically avoided telling people, it was just...irrelevant. 

_What part of our history's reinvented, under rug swept? What part of your memoy is selective and tends to forget? What with this distance it seems so obvious_

> _Just make sure you don't tell on me, especially to members of your family_  
>  We best keep this to ourselves and not tell any members of our inner posse  
> I wish I could tell the world 'cause you're such a pretty thing when you're done up properly  
> I might wanna marry you one day if you watch that weight and you keep  
> your firm body

Maybe it really didn't matter. The hearings were over...the censure had been passed by Congress, then overcome by half an hour into the State of the Union, she was going to forfeit her license for the rest of their term in the White House, she didn't have to testify to anyone or anything. 

Except to herself. And as much as she wished she could say she wouldn't lie and break the law and do all those allegedly bad things if she had them to do over again...she would. She knew that - she'd kept alive the man she loved, using any means necessary. She stood by her convictions, and stood by her husband - overshadower or not. He had been Jed long before he had been the President, and she loved him regardless. 

Even if he was an enormous jackass. 

> _Ooh, this could be messy and_  
>  Ooh, I don't seem to mind  
> Ooh, don't go telling everybody  
> And overlook this supposed crime  
> We'll flash forward to a few years later  
> And no one knows except the both of us  
> And I have honoured your request for silence  
> And you've washed your hands clean of this...


End file.
